Unbearable Lightness Of Barry Manilow Holds His Head High In Often-contemptuous World

October 30, 1990|By Bill Zehme, Rolling Stone

When Barry Manilow tells a Barry Manilow joke, he usually tells this one: Record mogul announces to Ethiopian embassy that a collective of music stars is making a single to benefit the blighted country's starving masses.

''It's my favorite joke,'' he says, a tad giddily. ''But every time I tell it, people go, 'Aw, I'm sorry.' It makes me look kind of pathetic, I guess.''

Jokes cling like barnacles to his career, impervious vessel that it is. He epitomizes grace under mockery. ''I feel bad for Dan Quayle, let me tell you,'' he says, all largess. ''You want to talk about being the butt of jokes. . . .''

Nevertheless, he has stopped his share: nose jokes, clothes jokes, geek jokes, masculinity jokes (Barely ManEnough, alas). Not only does he know all the barbs, he actually archives them.

In his home, he has festooned a prominent corridor with cartoon-strip razzings - from ''Bloom County'' to ''Andy Capp'' to ''Popeye.'' Simply, he curates a personal hall of shame, displays it in game defiance. He even has the artists sign the originals. ''I know they hate doing this,'' he says, giggling mischievously, as is his wont.

He has grown into his nose. So say his friends, and by this they mean two things: First, and few would quibble here, he looks better than he used to. He used to look, well, dorkier. Maturity has obliged him.

Second, and some will quibble here although they oughtn't, Barry Manilow has become formidable, extremely large, a legend even, in the show-business sense. At age 44, after 15 years of Top 40 toil and adult-contemporary lionization, he is a giant among entertainers. He endures. He adapts. He persists. There is always a new album (22 with the recent release of Because It's Christmas; the 90-minute videocassette of his 21st album, Barry Manilow Live on Broadway, reached No. 1 on the Billboard chart this summer). There is always a world tour.

Most probably, he is the showman of Our Generation. He lives for production values, for rich staging, for catchy hooks and big finishes. He wants your goose flesh. Musically, he is a populist nonpareil. Frank Sinatra, it is said, once jabbed a finger at Manilow and portentously announced, ''He's next.''

Even so, he is beset with insecurity. He is an outcast and has resigned himself to it. As his favorite joke suggests, he did not participate in the pop congress of ''We Are the World''; he was not asked. And this was fine with him.

''I'm not in that clique,'' he reasons. ''I've never really been a group person. I've always been a loner.'' He realizes he has no other choice. He cannot fathom his place in the culture. He feels uncategorizable, adrift, a freak.

''I am a musical misfit,'' he readily admits. ''I've never been able to put myself into a musical slot. I don't consider myself a cohort of Billy Joel - he's more rock 'n' roll. Kenny Rogers is more country. Barbra (Streisand) is a little older, more theatrical, actresslike. Neil Diamond is guitar-oriented, gruff. I don't know where I fit in.''

Some random Barry Manilow findings, gleaned from months of scrutiny: He has recurring nightmares about concentration camps. He does not know why but surmises that ''it probably all has to do with my feeling undeserving of any success.''

If he could be anyone else, he would be Sting. ''He's on his own path,'' he says, admiringly. ''I wish that I could be as brave as he has been with his career and his life.''

Next choice: Tom Waits. ''He sings from his kishkes.''

''Lite'' radio stations, the kind that broadcast his own work, bore him. ''I'm grateful that they play me, don't get me wrong,'' he says, ''but I just can't get behind them. Pop radio has never challenged me.'' Mostly, he tunes in rock or jazz.

If told tomorrow to forsake singing ''Copacabana'' (his biggest hit) and ''Can't Smile Without You'' in concert, he would not sulk. Also, the lyrics of his signature anthem, ''I Write the Songs,'' have always embarrassed him, at least in theory. Especially since somebody else wrote the song. He laments: ''It will follow me for the rest of my life, I guess.''

Best work is hidden

He feels his best work is unreleasable: an album of would-be standards he composed for lyrics bequeathed him by the widow of the legendary songwriter Johnny Mercer (''Moon River,'' ''Skylark'').

''These are old-fashioned pop melodies completely out of place in 1990,'' he says, grieving. ''Maybe when I'm dead, they'll all come out.''

He barely eats. And he would rather die than eat Parmesan cheese. He tends to brush his teeth every couple of hours. Touch his newspapers before he does and risk death. Same goes for magazines. He hates surprises and spiders. He loves Roger Rabbit and white gardenias. The mention of outdoor activities makes him apoplectic.